What HBCUs Must Do To Survive [Opinion]

In a piece for the Huffington Post, Jarrett L. Carter writes that many of the schools urgently need to make some simple adjustments.

HBCUs must keep up the same academic rigor and heartfelt investment between faculty and student. This is not only the most endearing way to learn, but a proven system of developing high-achieving and remedial students alike on the same path to academic success. A new part must be added to this system; a challenge for each student to develop his own business as part of his academic journey.

Every HBCU freshman orientation should offer history of the university and development of a personal business plan. Students would be instructed on what they are, who they are, where they are from and how these things build a personal and professional brand. They would required to change and amend that plan, with an exit interview of how their plan developed over the course of four-to-six years at the institution.

It doesn’t even need them to pick a major, just a commitment to objectively describing what they want their life to amount to and how education, family, spirituality and society influence the personal business plan.